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The date 2025 could appear more futuristic. Perhaps it's the sound of the letter "f" in "five". But 2026 signifies a leap forward, and it's where we currently stand, with each futuristic advancement – primarily the widespread adoption of artificial intelligence – appearing dystopian, or perhaps more grim. (Doesn't it feel like in a proper dystopia, the mind-dulling corporate-backed anti-human technology might function more effectively?) Didn't anyone sound the alarm about this?

The response, at least concerning science fiction films from years ago (or sometimes months ago) positioned in 2026, is a mixed bag. Some of those warnings are universally relevant (worldwide disaster) but in detail far-fetched (when mankind is inevitably decimated, we will almost certainly take the primate species with us). Others of them are visionary; others just look like poor visual effects. But it's valuable to explore where different directors, ranging from masters to grunts, thought we'd be situated by now in our planet's evolution. Therefore, we shall take a look at some of the movies that have been set in 2026 throughout cinematic history and determine if they have anything to impart.

The Game 'Doom'

Well, this doesn't bode well. In the universe of the game-to-film translation *Doom*, whose 20th anniversary was recently celebrated by virtually no one, 2026 is the year that humanity finds a gateway to an ancient city on Mars, where the people of Earth can establish a scientific outpost. Now, the bad stuff – regarding plot and concerning over-the-top cinematic imitations of a FPS video game – does not actually transpire for another 20 years later, so even if we do discover a portal to Mars this year, we could gain a respite to avert true disaster. Were we to uncover a passageway to an ancient Martian city, it's truly hard to tell whether Elon Musk would remain extremely excited to send everyone to Mars or would instantly become disheartened that the discovery wasn't something he funded himself, enabling him to assert savior-like credit for humanity's expansion to the cosmos. This precedes we even get to the collection of Martian chromosomes and subsequent transformations into monstrous beings. (Once more, this is nearer 2046, distinct from the acclaimed director's film.) In general, *Doom* is (if nothing else) a good test case for why, exactly we allow Mars become a long-term aspiration for humanity. Whether in John Carpenter's cheap-looking space-western *Ghosts of Mars*, the realistic science fiction of *Red Planet*, or the new-age spiritualism of *Mission to Mars*, our far-off planet rarely act as a beacon of hope. Should someone wishes to close that questionable red-planet property deal, maybe they ought to begin with at least making the fantasy version appear appealing.

The Marvel Dregs

A of the goofiest quirks of the current Marvel Cinematic Universe is how to account for the various world-threatening disasters, including a half-decade leap whose events are largely undepicted in the films themselves; the films have become like a clock radio perpetually running a few minutes fast – only instead of minutes, it's annual increments. So there's a large assortment of MCU content that various wikis clarify to be set in 2026. The good ones, like *Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3* and the underappreciated adventure *The Marvels*, take place distant from Earth, and so seem pretty detached from our sense of time. However the poorer material is among the weakest Marvel has ever produced: the nonsensically meandering TV show *Secret Invasion* and the Zoom-call debacle of *Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania*. Based on this stuff, we're in for a whole lot of annoying wheel-spinning in 2026, along with the related spin that actually, this confusing mess happening before our eyes is essential to whatever happens next. More troublingly, in the real world that assertion will probably turn out to be accurate.

The Apes Saga Continues

The majority of the classic five-movie *Planet of the Apes* series is set in the further-flung future of Earth, but the modern series that started with 2011’s *Rise of the Planet of the Apes* starts nearer the present, initiating its timeline approximately 2016. Thus, when a pathogen that devastates the majority of Earth’s people has done its damage, and simultaneously enhanced the cognitive abilities of apes, it’s only 2026, with additional human indignities (and simian triumphs) to come. The end-credits sequence of *Rise*, depicting how swiftly this virus propagates globally and set in 2019, appears downright eerie in the aftermath of the actual pandemic that would begin in 2020. In contrast, the movie *Dawn* looks more abstract; astonishingly, we’re already six years out from the spread of Covid-19, and humanity, though clearly wounded by the ongoing virus, was not wiped out, and our technology definitely has not been knocked out. But this most pessimistic of the quartet of contemporary *Apes* movies (to date!) nonetheless contains a significant bummer in store, implying that human and/or ape nature, however one defines either, will inevitably lead to warfare, no matter the efforts of the best-intentioned among us. We’re subject to the whims of those who appeal to others’ worst instincts, although those drives are not held by the majority. Currently, it feels hard to dispute that, even though we probably should.

Metropolis

Easily the best-known portrayal of 2026 in film is from a movie nearing marking its centennial. The director's silent classic *Metropolis* is set in a futuristic city where rich businessmen lord over the towers as laborers work tirelessly below the surface on the machines that keep everything running. Affluent city-dweller Freder, scion of the city’s master, has his eyes opened to these massive social gaps when he falls for Maria, an underground organizer who preaches a coming together of the separate strata of Metropolis. A inventor with darker plans creates a automaton in her image, aiming to bring the whole of Metropolis down in flames. Here, a machine created to mimic a human isn't a tool of the elite, but an entity who wants to see them destroyed; it's a component inverted by reality in a future that in other ways seems to be well on its way. *Metropolis* also imagines a world where technology relies on traditional human toil, which seems like a most logical union of conservative disdain for “the working class” and business zeal for an AI bubble. It has not yet materialized, but it's easy to imagine a somewhat less stylish-looking version of Lang’s city growing with the prospect of a resurgence to manufacturing. The trickier, less plausible accomplishment is the conclusion of the film, where the gap between the haves and the poor is bridged with compassion; rather than with concrete reforms. Similar to *Dawn of the Planet of the Apes*, the movie advocates peaceful cohabitation; unlike *Dawn*, it appears optimistic about the possibility